Marketing students tackle international sustainability

Marketing students from around Europe faced the challenge of promoting cruise line Cunard’s luxury suites earlier this month, as part of a series of activities put on by Solent University for International Marketing Week.

Over the spring, a network of 12 universities across Europe put on international weeks that see students given a real-world marketing project for a partner company of the host university.

This year’s brief tasked students with trying to sell the Cunard Grill package – a high end cruise suite – to a new target group in Europe. They were given a ‘budget’ of £250,000 and told to create a multimedia campaign, a pitch, and a detailed plan to support an overnight launch event.

The winning team proposed a partnership with a company selling ocean cleaning vessels, which would link to sustainability, a message that could be promoted to the target audience. They also proposed a high end magazine and an exclusive auction.

Of the winning group, Bob Dixon, Carnival/Cunard Director – EMEA, Asia and Latin America, says: “I liked the idea of hosting an event with an environmental theme, but what impressed me most was the quality of the presentation, how they had included all team members, and the intelligent use of their budget. We asked some tough questions and they responded with some very robust answers.

“To be fair to the other teams, this year the standard of the presentations and ideas were particularly high. We’ve done this for three years now and every year the quality of the students’ output just keeps getting better.

“We hope that the students get some insight into how to compile and deliver a marketing pitch. In the real world, agencies who do this well tend to win the business.”

One of the members of the winning group, Aistė Veisaitė, from Denmark, says: “I feel great to have won; there were so many great presentations that could have been worthy winners, but it feels really nice to be the best.

“Over the week I learnt that different countries take a slightly different approach to marketing, so it was really useful to find out the different methods.”